Caves Learning & Skills Bicycle Repair Workshop

Recently we covered the news of Longcroft School receiving mountain bikes as part of an extended schools project. The following article explains a bit more about how the bikes are restored and where else they are sent.

At the Caves Learning & Skills Bicycle Repair Workshop, offenders are employed to service and renovate old bicycles, bringing them back up to a roadworthy standard that meets the criteria of the Highway Code.

Old bicycles are obtained from a wide range of sources, including stolen/recovered from police stations in the local area (such as Hull, Goole, Beverly, Driffield, Bridlington, Withernsea and Hornsea) and charitable donations. Once they arrive in the workshop, they are assessed as to their condition and all appropriate repairs and renovation are undertaken.

The repair programme includes stripping the cycles down to their component parts and servicing all the individual components before reassembling and testing for quality and safety; there is a dedicated quality team that inspects every single cycle to set criteria to ensure consistency in the quality of the finished cycle. Some cycles are painted to restore an appropriate finish.

Upon completion, finished cycles are donated to any charity that requests them. Past beneficiaries include the Chernobyl Children’s Project, several orphanages in the Ukraine, Morocco and South Africa, and various projects in Algeria, Albania, India and the Gambia.

Caves Learning & Skills Bicycle Repair Workshop have also donated children’s bicycles to several nursery and primary schools in the local area, including Neasden and Biggin Hill Primaries in Hull and Parkside Primary in Goole.